Method and Apparatus for Aperture Detection of 3D Hearing Aid Shells

ABSTRACT

A method identifying apertures of ear impressions is disclosed. A plurality of contour lines associated with an ear impression are determined and a difference value between a value of a characteristic, such as the diameter, of each contour line and that characteristic of an adjacent contour line is determined. The aperture is identified as being that contour line having the greatest difference value. The contour lines are determined by identifying where a plane intersects the surface of the graphical representations. In another embodiment, the contour lines are assigned a weight. A contour index is then calculated for each contour line as a function of the difference value and these weights. According to this embodiment, the aperture is identified as being a contour line that is adjacent to that contour line having the greatest contour index.

This patent application claims the benefit of U.S. ProvisionalApplication No. 60/723,850, filed Oct. 5, 2005, which is herebyincorporated by reference herein in its entirety.

CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS

The present application is also related to U.S. Patent Application Ser.No. 60/716,671, titled Method and Apparatus for the Registration of 3DEar Impression Models (Attorney Docket Number 2005P16586US); U.S. PatentApplication Ser. No. 60/723,849, titled Method and Apparatus for theRigid Registration of 3D Ear Impression Shapes with Skeletons (AttorneyDocket Number 2005P18062US); and U.S. Patent Application Ser. No.60/723,660, titled Method and Apparatus for the Rigid and Non-RigidRegistration of 3D Shapes (Attorney Docket Number 2005P18054US), all ofwhich are being filed simultaneously herewith and are herebyincorporated by reference herein in their entirety.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

The present invention relates generally to the feature extraction fromthree-dimensional objects and, more particularly, from three-dimensionalear impression models.

The manufacturing of medical devices designed to conform to anatomicalshapes, such as hearing aids, has traditionally been a manuallyintensive process due to the complexity of the shape of the devices.FIG. 1A shows a diagram of a human ear that is, for example, the ear ofa patient requiring a hearing aid. Specifically, ear 100 has variousidentifiable parts such as, for example, aperture 102, crus 103, canal104, concha 105 and cymba 106. As one skilled in the art will recognize,in order to produce a hearing aid for the patient, an ear impression istypically taken. Various processes for taking such ear impressions havebeen developed, but most such processes typically involve inserting apliable material into an ear and allowing that material to harden sothat, when it is removed, the contours of the different parts of theear, such as parts 102-106 of FIG. 1A, are accurately reflected on theimpression. Such an ear impression reflecting the parts of ear 100 ofFIG. 1A is shown in FIG. 1B. More particularly, ear impression 101 hasaperture portion 102A corresponding to aperture 102 of FIG. 1A; crusportion 103A corresponding to crus 103 of FIG. 1A; canal portion 104Acorresponding to canal 104 in FIG. 1A; concha portion 105A correspondingto concha 105 of FIG. 1A; cymba portion 106A corresponding to cymba 106;and lower body portion 107A.

Different methods have been used to create ear molds, or shells, fromear impressions. One skilled in the art will recognize that the termsear mold and ear shell are used interchangeably and refer to the housingthat is designed to be inserted into an ear and which contains theelectronics of a hearing aid. Traditional methods of manufacturing suchhearing aid shells typically require significant manual processing tofit the hearing aid to a patient's ear by, for example, sanding orotherwise removing material from the shell in order to permit it toconform better to the patient's ear. More recently, however, attemptshave been made to create more automated manufacturing methods forhearing aid shells. In some such attempts, ear impressions are digitizedand then entered into a computer for processing and editing. The resultis a digitized model of the ear impressions that can then be digitallymanipulated. One way of obtaining such a digitized model uses athree-dimensional laser scanner, which is well known in the art, to scanthe surface of the impression both horizontally and vertically Theresult of such scanning is a digitized model of the ear impressionhaving a plurality of points, referred to herein as a point cloudrepresentation, forming a graphical image of the impression inthree-dimensional space. FIG. 2 shows an illustrative point cloudgraphical representation 201 of the hearing aid impression 101 of FIG.1B. As one skilled in the art will recognize, the number of points inthis graphical point cloud representation is directly proportional tothe resolution of the laser scanning process used to scan theimpression. For example, such scanning may produce a point cloudrepresentation of a typical ear impression that has 30,000 points.

Once such a digitized model of an ear shell has been thus created, thenvarious computer-based software tools may have been used to manuallyedit the graphical shape of each ear impression individually to, forexample, create a model of a desired type of hearing aid for that ear.As one skilled in the art will recognize, such types of hearing aids mayinclude in-the-ear (ITE) hearing aids, in-the-canal (ITC) hearing aids,completely-in-the-canal (CIC) hearing aids and other types of hearingaids. Each type of hearing aid requires different editing of thegraphical model in order to create an image of a desired hearing aidshell size and shape according to various requirements. Theserequirements may originate from a physician, from the size of theelectronic hearing aid components to be inserted into the shell or,alternatively, may originate from a patient's desire for specificaesthetic and ergonomic properties.

Once the desired three-dimensional hearing aid shell design is obtained,various computer-controlled manufacturing methods, such as well knownlithographic or laser-based manufacturing methods, are then used tomanufacture a physical hearing aid shell conforming to the edited designout of a desired shell material such as, for example, a biocompatiblepolymer material.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

The present inventors have recognized that, while the aforementionedmethods for designing hearing aid shells are advantageous in manyregards, they are also disadvantageous in some aspects. In particular,prior attempts at computer-assisted hearing aid manufacturing typicallytreat each ear mold individually, requiring the manual processing ofdigitized representations of individual ear impressions. Such attemptshave typically relied on the manual identification of the variousfeatures of an ear impression and individual editing of the graphicalmodel of each ear impression. However, the present inventors haverecognized that it is desirable to be able to process in an automatedfashion two ear molds corresponding to, for example, each ear of apatient, together in order to decrease the time required to design thehearing aid molds.

Accordingly, the present inventors have invented an improved method ofdesigning hearing aid molds whereby two shapes corresponding tographical images of ear impressions are registered with each other tofacilitate joint processing of the hearing aid design. In particular,the present inventors have invented an improved method of designinghearing aid molds whereby apertures of ear impressions are identifiedwhich could be useful for applications such as registering the graphicalrepresentations of a plurality of hearing aid impressions and automaticdetailing of hearing aid impressions. In a first embodiment, a pluralityof contour lines associated with an ear impression are determined and adifference value is determined between a value of a characteristic, suchas the diameter, of each contour line and that characteristic of anadjacent contour line. The aperture is identified as being that contourline having the maximum value of that difference value. In a secondembodiment, the contour lines are determined by orienting a graphicalrepresentation of the ear impression in a desired orientation, such asvertically in three-dimensional space. Then, a plane, such as ahorizontal plane, is caused to intersect with the graphicalrepresentation at different levels. Contour lines are determined byidentifying where the plane intersects the surface of the graphicalrepresentation. In yet another embodiment, the contour lines areassigned a weight according to the positions of those contour linesrelative to the graphical representation. A contour index is thencalculated for each contour line as a function of a difference value andthese weights. According to this embodiment, the aperture is identifiedas being a contour line that is adjacent to that contour line having thegreatest contour index.

These and other advantages of the invention will be apparent to those ofordinary skill in the art by reference to the following detaileddescription and the accompanying drawings.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

FIG. 1A shows a graphical depiction of an ear of a patient to be fittedwith a hearing aid;

FIG. 1B shows a prior art ear impression taken of the ear of FIG. 1A;

FIG. 2 shows a point cloud representation of the ear impression of FIG.1B;

FIG. 3 shows a graphical point cloud representation in accordance withan embodiment of the present invention whereby a plurality of horizontalslices are obtained by intersecting a horizontal plane with therepresentation of FIG. 2;

FIG. 4 shows contour lines in accordance with an embodiment of thepresent invention representing the intersection of an illustrative pointcloud representation surface with a horizontal plane at different levelsof the representation;

FIG. 5 shows a graphical depiction of how a contour index is used toidentify an aperture of an ear impression in accordance with anembodiment of the present invention;

FIG. 6 shows a reduced set of points in a point cloud representation ofan ear impression in accordance with an embodiment of the presentinvention;

FIG. 7 shows a close up view of the aperture area of a point cloudrepresentation of an ear impression in accordance with an embodiment ofthe present invention;

FIG. 8 is a flow chart showing the steps of a method in accordance withan embodiment of the present invention, and

FIG, 9 shows a computer adapted to perform the illustrative steps of themethod of FIG. 8 as well as other functions associated with theregistration of point cloud representations of ear impressions.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

The present inventors have recognized that it is desirable to useregistration techniques to align two ear impressions with each other,for example the ear impressions of both ears of a patient, in order toimprove the design process of hearing aid shells. Registration of twodifferent surfaces is a fundamental task with numerous potentialapplications in various fields. As is well known and as used herein,registration is generally defined as the alignment of two surfacesthrough the use of various three-dimensional transformation techniques,such as, for example, three dimensional surface rotation andtranslation. Registration typically involves aligning two shapes in sucha way as to allow the comparison of the shapes to, for example, identifysimilarities and differences between those shapes. While suchregistration is a fundamental technique and can be very useful, theregistration of two complex three-dimensional (3D) shapes, such asshapes formed by ear impressions used in the manufacture of hearingaids, is not trivial. In fact, in such cases, registration may be verycomputationally and practically difficult. Prior registration attemptsin various fields have typically represented shapes to be registeredusing point-based, feature-based or model-based methods. As one skilledin the art will recognize, point-based methods model a surface byrepresenting that surface using a number of points. For example, asdiscussed above, a typical representation of an ear impression mayconsist of 30,000 such points on the surface to be registered. Then,various calculations are made to align each point on one surface with acorresponding point on another surface. Model-based registrationmethods, on the other hand use statistical modeling methods, instead ofsurface points, to describe the surfaces of a shape.

Such prior point-based and model-based registration methods typically donot attempt to simplify the representation of the surface to a morecompact description of that surface (i.e., to reduce the amount ofinformation that requires processing during registration) but, instead,use all or a large subset of all the points on the surface to describe ashape. Thus, these methods are very computationally intensive.

Feature-based methods, on the other hand, are useful for reducing theamount of information used to register two shapes. Such methodstypically represent different landmarks or features of a shape as lowerdimensional shapes, such as cylinders, quadrics, geons, skeletons andother such simplified geometric shapes. In such attempts, theselandmarks or features on a surface are typically identified manuallywhich increases the time required to perform the registration process.In addition, such attempts are typically not consistently repeatable dueto the subjective nature of manually identifying simple shapes. Finally,as one skilled in the art will recognize, feature-based registrationmethods are further limited because the use of such simplified shapestypically leads to relatively rough registration results.

Therefore, the present inventors have recognized that, instead of usingprior point, model or feature-based registration methods, it isdesirable to perform the registration of ear impressions using actualanatomic regions to align two impressions. In particular, the presentinventors have recognized that it is desirable to use the apertureregions of two ear impressions of a patient (e.g., the impressions ofthe left and right ears of the patient) in order to register those earimpressions with each other. Such a registration is desirable since thelocation of the two apertures of the patient (corresponding to each ear)are fixed in position relative to one another and also closelycorrespond in size and shape with each other for any particularindividual. Thus, by using the aperture to register the two earimpressions, various editing operations may be used as described aboveto remove or reshape the different surfaces of both ear impressionssimultaneously in order to create a model of an ear shell.

However, in order to be able to use anatomical regions, such as theaperture, for registration purposes, those regions must first beidentified on each impression. One skilled in the art will recognizethat various methods of identifying regions of an ear impression arepossible, such as the manual selection of those regions prior toregistration. In accordance with an embodiment of the present invention,anatomical regions of a point cloud representation of an ear impressionare automatically identified. Referring once again to FIG. 2, in orderto accomplish such automatic identification according to thisembodiment, the point cloud representation 201 of the impression isfirst oriented such that the tip 202 of the impression is orientedvertically as the highest portion of the point cloud representation 201and the base 203 of the impression is oriented on plane 204 as thelowest portion of the point cloud representation. It will be obvious toone skilled in the art how to achieve such an orientation of a pointcloud representation. For example, during laser scanning, typically thebase 203 of the ear impression is not actually scanned since the baseportion of any resulting ear mold does not have to conform to anyanatomical region. As a result, the base of a scanned impression istypically represented as an opening in the bottom area of the pointcloud representation of the ear impression. This may be accomplished,for example, by using well-known principle component analysis techniquesto align this opening with plane 204. It will also be obvious to oneskilled in the art in light of the teachings herein that various otherorientations, other than a vertical orientation, may be used withequally advantageous results.

Next, according to this embodiment, once the ear impression has beenvertically oriented, a plurality of horizontal slices are taken of thepoint cloud representation. These slices are taken, for example, bymoving a horizontal plane, such as plane 204, down the point cloudrepresentation along the y-axis from the canal tip area 202 of FIG. 2towards the base area 203 of FIG. 2 and identifying the intersection ofthat plane with the surface of the point cloud representation 201. Suchan intersection of a plane with the surface of the point cloudrepresentation 201 will result in one or more contour lines on thatplane. FIG-3 shows how a horizontal plane will intersect the earimpression to create slices 305 in the point cloud representation. FIG.4, discussed further herein below, shows a view of three illustrativecontour lines 401, 402 and 403 corresponding to slices 303, 306 and 302of FIG. 3, respectively. Contour lines 401, 402 and 403 are merelyrepresentative in nature and one skilled in the art will recognize thatsuch contour lines will typically be more complex shapes than the ovalshapes of FIG. 4.

Depending on the distance between the horizontal slices, there may bemore than one contour line at a particular level representing twodifferent intersections of the point cloud representation with aparticular horizontal plane. For example, referring again to FIG. 3,contour line 306 on the canal and concha portion of the point cloudrepresentation and contour line 307 on the cymba portion of therepresentation may be obtained from a single slice taken with aparticular horizontal plane. Similarly, contour lines 308 on the conchaportion of the point cloud representation may be obtained from the sameslices that produced contour lines 309 on the canal portion of therepresentation. Such multiple slices occur when the horizontal plane atthe particular level intersects different portions of the point cloudrepresentation of the ear impression corresponding to differentanatomical regions of an ear

In order to identify a particular anatomical region, in this case theaperture, any multiple slices must be resolved by removing any contourlines not corresponding, in this case, to the aperture, canal and lowerbody portions of the point cloud representation of the ear impression.Since these different regions, as discussed in association with FIGS. 1Aand 1B, are clearly identifiable, it is possible to select and removefrom consideration any contour lines not corresponding to the apertureand canal portions. Such selection and removal may be accomplished, forexample, automatically on a computer, discussed further herein below,running appropriate software for the graphical editing of the pointcloud representation and contour lines. Such a selection and removal maybe accomplished automatically by, for example, calculating the center ofeach contour line and, when multiple contour lines are present at agiven level, only using that contour line having a center closest to thecenter of the immediately preceding contour line. Alternatively, suchselection and removal may be accomplished manually by, for example,using a mouse and computer pointer to select contour lines for removal.Once the contour lines not corresponding to the canal/aperture and lowerbody portions of the point cloud representation have been removed, theresult is what is referred to herein as an aperture profile thatconsists of contour lines corresponding only to the canal/aperture andlower body portions of the point cloud representation.

Once the aperture profile of contour lines has been identified, inaccordance with an embodiment of the present invention, the apertureportion of the point cloud representation may be automaticallyidentified. In particular, in accordance with this embodiment, a filterrule is calculated to extract an aperture profile function whose maximumvalue defines the actual aperture contour line on the point cloudrepresentation of the ear impression. Specifically, such a filter rulecan be defined by the expression: $\begin{matrix}{{{val}_{i} = {f_{i}^{*}\left( {d_{i} - d_{i - 1}} \right)}},\quad{f_{i} = {1 - \frac{i}{N}}},{2 \leq i \leq N}} & \left( {{Equation}\quad 1} \right) \\{{{pos} = {{\arg\quad\max\limits_{i}} = {\left( {val}_{i} \right) - 1}}},{1 \leq {pos} \leq {N - 1}}} & \left( {{Equation}\quad 2} \right)\end{matrix}$where val_(i) is the contour line index for contour line i, pos is thecontour line to be identified as the aperture, N is the number ofcontour lines, d_(i)−d_(i−1) is the difference between the diameters ofthe i and the i−1 contour lines, and f_(i) is a weighting factor,discussed herein below, applied to contour line i. As discussed above,FIG. 4 shows a schematic top view of aperture profile contour lines inwhich contour line 401 represents contour line 303 of FIG. 3, contourline 402 represents contour line 306 of FIG. 3 and contour line 403represents contour line 302 of FIG. 3. Points of each contour line i areconsidered as vectors {right arrow over (v)}_(ij) originating from thecenter of that contour line. The term d_(i) represents the differencebetween the two maximum projection values of these vectors onto thesecond principal component {right arrow over (p)}c₂ of the lowestcontour line C_(N). Accordingly, one may anticipate that the value ofd_(i)−d_(i−1) alone has its maximum value at the aperture contour line,such as at contour line 302 in FIG. 3 corresponding to contour line 402in FIG. 4.

However, the present inventors have recognized that using d_(i)−d_(i−1)alone may not be sufficient to identify the aperture of the point cloudrepresentation of the ear impression in all cases. In particular, earimpressions exhibiting a shallow concha may be misclassified In suchcases contours below the expected aperture may be mistakenly identifiedas the aperture. Accordingly, as shown in Equation 1, the values ofd_(i)−d_(i−1) are weighted with factor f_(i), which has the effect ofassigning a higher importance to the canal region. Factor f_(i) iscalculated as described in the second line of Equation 1 and decreasesthe weight applied to each successive contour line as the distance ofthe contour line from the canal portion of the point cloudrepresentation increases.

FIG. 5 shows a graph of the values of Equation 1 calculated for eachcontour line 305 of FIG. 3. Referring to that figure, the contour linewith contour index 1 corresponds to scan line 301 in FIG. 3, the contourline with contour index 9 corresponds to contour line 302 in FIG. 3 andthe contour line with contour index 21 corresponds to contour line 303in FIG. 3. The remaining contour index values corresponding to thecontour lines 305 shown in FIG. 3. Equation 2 determines the actualaperture by determining the contour line having the maximum value of thecontour index of Equation 1 and then identifying the contour lineimmediately preceding that maximum value contour line. Thus, accordingto the foregoing method, the aperture of the ear impression can beidentified for each impression to be registered. Once again, this methodis merely illustrative in nature and one skilled in the art willrecognize in light of the teachings herein that many suitable methodsfor identifying an aperture or other region of a point cloudrepresentation of ear impressions, such as manually identifying such aregion, can be used with advantageous results.

Once the aperture of the ear impression has been identified, inaccordance with another embodiment of the present invention, in order toregister two ear impressions having such identified apertures, a denserset of points corresponding to, for example, the canal, aperture, andconcha portions of the point cloud representation of the ear impressionis used to increase the accuracy of the hearing aid shell design. Such adenser set of points from these areas is desirable since these are theregions to which the hearing aid device will ultimately be fit in apatient's ear. The present inventors have recognized that, in accordancethis embodiment, it is not desirable to include points in this denserset of points from the cymba, canal tip or lower body regions toregister the two ear impressions since these areas are typically removedduring the hearing aid manufacturing process. Thus, removing thesepoints from the denser set of points reduces computational complexity ofthe registration process. As one skilled in the art will recognize inlight of the teachings herein, detection of the cymba is possible bydetecting topological variations of the contour of the surface of thepoint cloud representation as occur between, for example, the canal andcymba portions of the ear impression. However, the present inventorshave recognized that such variations are not always readily apparent.Thus, in order to identify portions of the point cloud representationfrom which points can be removed from consideration during registration,in accordance with another embodiment, a reference point p_(r) isidentified that is known to be located in one or more of these regions,such as the cymba 106A in FIG. 1B. $\begin{matrix}{{p_{r} = {\arg\quad{\max\limits_{p \in P}\left\lbrack {\frac{p - c}{{p - c}}*x*{{p - c}}} \right\rbrack}}},{{x} = 1}} & \left( {{Equation}\quad 3} \right)\end{matrix}$where p_(r) is a reference point definitely located in the cymba 106Aregion, P is the set of all contour points, c is the center point of theaperture contour and x is the x-axis of the local coordinate frame whichis oriented from concha 105A to cymba 106A. As one skilled in the artwill recognize, the expression ∥p−c∥ ensures that Equation 3 will favorpoints of, for example, the cymba 106A region to be removed and theexpression [(p−c)/(μp−c∥)]·x provides a directional constraint whichgives a higher weight to the points on the surface of the cymba 106A.

Thus, according to Equation 3, only those points that are closer to theaperture center than p_(r) are retained, resulting in a set of points pthat primarily belong to canal 104A, aperture 102A, and concha 105Aregions. Similar calculations may be performed for other areas fromwhich points in the point cloud representation are to be removed.Additionally, points below a desired point on the y-axis of the pointcloud representation, corresponding with a portion of the lower body ofthe representation, may also be removed. FIG. 6 shows such a resultingillustrative set of points of a point cloud representation 601 of an earimpression whereby the points corresponding to the cymba portion 603,the canal tip portion 602 and the lower body have been removed.Accordingly, only points corresponding to the canal region 605, apertureregion 607 and concha region 606 remain. Illustratively, this point setmay consist of approximately 200 points, which is a very compact shaperepresentation when compared to the original input point set withapproximately 30,000 points and when compared to the number of pointstypically used in prior registration attempts.

Once the aforementioned set of points corresponding to only the canal,aperture and concha regions of two ear impressions have been identified,correspondences between the points related to the apertures of those earimpressions, must be determined in order to register the twoimpressions. In particular in order to find the best pair-wisecorrespondences between two sets of aperture points, it is necessary toconsider the relation of these points to the global surface.Specifically, a local coordinate system is defined as shown in FIG. 6for each of the ear impressions. The y-axis of the coordinate system isdefined as being normal to the horizontal cutting plane, discussedherein above and the y-axis is assumed to be off the center of mass. Thex-direction represents the main orientation of the horizontal directionfrom canal 605 to cymba 603 and the second major direction defines thez-axis which points in the horizontal direction from canal 605 to concha606. This coordinate system is used to extract the reduced set offeature points from the aperture contour in a defined order. The set ofaperture points may be defined to be any suitable number of points thatadequately define the shape and orientation of the aperture insufficient detail that pair-wise correspondences between two sets ofsuch points (e.g., corresponding to the apertures of two different earsof a patient). In one illustrative embodiment, the set of pointscorresponding to the aperture consists of 16 equally-spaced aperturepoints along the aperture contour line 607 of FIG. 6 plus threeadditional points: the aperture center point and the center points oftwo canal contour lines above the aperture contour. FIG. 7 shows a moredetailed view of these points. In particular, FIG. 7 shows the portionof ear impression 601 of FIG. 6 and the aperture contour line 607 andpart of the canal portion 605. More particularly, FIG. 7 shows theillustrative 16 points along the aperture contour line 607, as well asthe center point 704 of that aperture contour line and the center points705 and 706 of the two contour lines immediately above the aperturecontour line. One skilled in the art will recognize in light of theforegoing that the resulting points identify an aperture vector in thatthey define the shape and orientation of an ear impression aperture tobe registered. One skilled in the art will also recognize that othermethods of identifying the shape and orientation of the aperture arepossible with equally advantageous results.

Once the apertures of two ear impressions have been thus characterizedas a vector, registration can be accomplished by estimating the sixregistration parameters necessary to map one aperture vector, denotedvector A₁, to another aperture vector, denoted vector A₂. These sixregistration parameters correspond to three-dimensional translation Tparameters and three-dimensional rotation R parameters. As one skilledin the art will recognize, such parameters identify the necessarytranslations along the x, y and z axes, and the three-dimensionalrotations about those axes, respectively, that are necessary to map oneof the aperture vectors onto the second aperture vector. One skilled inthe art will recognize that, while the present embodiment uses aparticular rigid registration technique, explained herein below, otherregistration techniques using, for example, well-known closed formsolutions or Newton methods on the energy function also be utilized tosolve for the rigid registration parameters with equally advantageousresults. In particular, using such parameters, it is possible toidentify an energy function to penalize a distance measurement L².Measurement L² represents the square of the distances betweencorresponding points of the two aperture vectors to be registered, andthat approaches zero as the second vector A₂ approaches alignment withthe first vector A₁. Such an energy function can illustratively bedefined by the expression:E(R,T)=∥A ₁−(r*A ₂ T+)∥²   (Equation 4)The aperture points can be represented as a set of 3D points such thatvector A₁[P₁, P₂, . . . , P_(n),] and vector A₂=[Q₁, Q₂, . . . , Q_(n)],where n is the number of points in each set of points in the respectiveaperture vector. Accordingly, Equation 4 becomes: $\begin{matrix}{E = {\sum\limits_{i = 1}^{n}{{P_{i} - \left( {{R*Q_{i}} + T} \right)}}^{2}}} & \left( {{Equation}\quad 5} \right)\end{matrix}$Then, the first variation of Equation 5 with regard to the translationparameters T^(k), k=1, . . . , 3 is given by the expression:$\begin{matrix}{{{\frac{\partial T^{k}}{\partial t} = {\sum\limits_{i = 1}^{n}{< \left\lbrack {P_{i} - \left( {{R*Q_{i}} + T} \right)} \right\rbrack}}},{\frac{\partial T}{\partial T^{k}} > {where}}}{{\frac{\partial T}{\partial T^{1}} = \begin{pmatrix}1 \\0 \\0\end{pmatrix}},{\frac{\partial T}{\partial T^{2}} = \begin{pmatrix}0 \\1 \\0\end{pmatrix}},{\frac{\partial T}{\partial T^{3}} = \begin{pmatrix}0 \\0 \\1\end{pmatrix}}}} & \left( {{Equation}\quad 6} \right)\end{matrix}$and <□, □> denotes an inner product in 3D Euclidean space.

In accordance with another embodiment, in order to define rotation ofthe aperture set in 3D, we use exponential coordinates, also known inthe art as twist coordinates, where a 3D vector w=(w₁, w₂, w₃)represents the rotation matrix. Using the 3D w vector, one skilled inthe art will recognize that it is possible to perform variousoperations, such as taking the derivations of the rotations rotationsfor the 3D translation vector T. A skew symmetric matrix correspondingto w can then be given by the expression: $\hat{w} = \begin{bmatrix}0 & {- w_{3}} & w_{2} \\w_{3} & 0 & {- w_{1}} \\{- w_{2}} & w_{1} & 0\end{bmatrix}$and the rotation matrix can be defined by R=e{circumflex over (^(w))}.Then the first variation of Equation 5 with regard to rotationparameters is given by the expression: $\begin{matrix}{{{\frac{\partial w^{k}}{\partial t} = {\sum\limits_{i = 1}^{n}{< \left\lbrack {P_{i} - \left( {{R*Q_{i}} + T} \right)} \right\rbrack}}},{{R*\frac{\partial\hat{w}}{\partial w^{k}}Q_{i}} > {where}}}{{{\frac{\partial\hat{w}}{\partial w^{1}}Q_{i}} = \begin{pmatrix}0 \\{- Z_{i}} \\Y_{i}\end{pmatrix}},{{\frac{\partial\hat{w}}{\partial w^{2}}Q_{i}} = \begin{pmatrix}Z_{i} \\0 \\{- X_{i}}\end{pmatrix}},{{\frac{\partial\hat{w}}{\partial w^{3}}Q_{i}} = \begin{pmatrix}{- Y_{i}} \\X_{i} \\0_{i}\end{pmatrix}}}} & \left( {{Equation}\quad 7} \right)\end{matrix}$One skilled in the art will note that, as an initial condition forEquations 6-8, it is assumed T₁=0, T₂=0, T₃=0, and similarly, w₁=0,w₂=0, w₃=0, which is equivalent to R=I (an identity matrix). Each timew=(w₁, w₂, w₃) is updated, a new rotation matrix can be computed as:R cos(t)I+sin(t)ŵ*+(1 cos(t))w*w ^(T)*where t=∥w∥, and w*=w/t. As one skilled in the art will recognize, agradient descent method, well known in the art, can be used withmomentum in order to optimize the motion parameters.

Since such an alignment method described herein above performsregistration on a reduced set of aperture points, it is fast andprovides an excellent initial registration result. One skilled in theart will recognize that it would be possible to adapt the foregoingapproach to refine this registration using more points of the pointcloud representations. However, such a refined registration processwould introduce significant delay and processing requirements into theinitial registration process. Therefore, in accordance with anotherembodiment of the present invention, after the apertures are alignedusing the approach described herein above, the alignment is refined byperforming dense surface registration using the well-known Grid ClosestPoint (GCP) algorithm, which does not require explicit correspondencesbetween each of the points on the surface to be calculated. The GCPalgorithm is also well known in the art and, therefore, will not bediscussed further herein other than is necessary for the understandingof the embodiments of the present invention. A more detailed discussionof this well-known algorithm can be found in S. M. Yamany, M. N. Ahmed,E. E. Hemayed, and A. A. Farag, “Novel surface registration using thegrid closest point (GCP) transform,” ICIP 98, vol. 3, 1998, which isincorporated by reference herein in its entirety. If explicitcorrespondences can be established, a similar situation exists as in theabove case and, therefore, it is not necessary to limit the presentembodiment to an iterative solution for registration. Rather, well-knownclosed form solutions or Newton methods on the energy function can alsobe utilized to solve for the rigid registration parameters.

As one skilled in the art will recognize, the GCP algorithm works wellin practice to refine registration results and is exceptionally fast. Inorder to perform this refined registration, the dense point sets (of,for example and as discussed above, 200 points) for each point cloudrepresentation are denoted as P (corresponding to the first, transformedpoint cloud representation) and M (corresponding to the second pointcloud representation), respectively. According to this algorithm,considering a rotation matrix R and a translation T as described hereinabove, the transformed points of data set P are given by:p _(i)(R,T)=Rp _(i) +T,1≦i≦N   (Equation 8)

In order to refine the initial registration obtained above, it isdesirable to minimize the sum of the squared individual distances E^(i)between the corresponding points between set P and set M according tothe expression: $\begin{matrix}{{E = {\sum\limits_{i = 1}^{N}E^{i}}}{with}} & \left( {{Equation}\quad 9} \right) \\{E^{i} = {{{{\arg\quad\min\limits_{m \in M}}}m} - {{p_{i}\left( {R,T} \right)}{{- {p_{i}\left( {R,T} \right)}}}^{2}}}} & \left( {{Equation}\quad 10} \right)\end{matrix}$

Hence, according to Equations 9 and 10, it is possible to determine therotation and translation parameters (R, T) that minimize the sum of theleast N squared individual distances E^(i)=d_(i) ²(R, T) between eachpoint in the set of points on the surfaces of the point cloudrepresentations One skilled in the art will recognize that, as discussedabove, it may be desirable to tune the results of the foregoing refinedregistration method by weighting points in one or more of the data setsaccording to their positions on the surfaces of the ear impression.Specifically, greater weights may be illustratively assigned to pointsassociated with the aperture 102A, concha 105A, and canal 106A regionsof FIG. 1B using, illustratively, a step function that rejects pointsnot belonging to these portions of the ear impression. In this way,other portions of the ear impression will not bias the registration,which helps to ensure that any hearing aid shell manufactured using theforegoing process will fit a patient in these important areas.

FIG. 8 shows a method in accordance with one embodiment of the presentinvention. Referring to that figure at step 801, ear impressions, suchas the ear impressions associated with both ears of a patient, arescanned using, for example, a well-known laser scanning method togenerate a point cloud representation of the ear impressions. Then, atstep 802, for each ear impression contour lines are generatedcorresponding to the surface of the point cloud representation. Asdescribed herein above, these contour lines may be obtained bypositioning the point cloud representation in a desired orientation andthen detecting the intersection of the point cloud representation and aplane at different levels along, illustratively, a vertical axis of thepoint cloud representation. Next, at step 803, the position of a desiredfeature, for example the aperture, is located for each ear impressionand, at step 804, the shape and orientation of the feature of each earimpression are represented by vectors. Once these vectors have beenidentified for each ear impression then, at step 805, those vectors areused to register the desired feature of both ear impressions. This isaccomplished, for example, by determining the three-dimensionalcomponents of translation and rotation necessary to align correspondingpoints of the vector of one point cloud representation of one earimpression with points of the vector of the point cloud representationof the other ear impression. Then, once the alignment of this feature ofboth ear impressions is completed, at step 806 the registration isrefined using, for example, the GCP algorithm described above.

The foregoing embodiments are generally described in terms ofmanipulating objects, such as lines, planes and three-dimensional shapesassociated with ear impression feature identification and ear impressionregistration. One skilled in the art will recognize that suchmanipulations may be, in various embodiments, virtual manipulationsaccomplished in the memory or other circuitry/hardware of anillustrative registration system. Such a registration system may beadapted to perform these manipulations, as well as to perform variousmethods in accordance with the above-described embodiments, using aprogrammable computer running software adapted to perform such virtualmanipulations and methods. An illustrative programmable computer usefulfor these purposes is shown in FIG. 9. Referring to that figure, aregistration system 907 is implemented on a suitable computer adapted toreceive, store and transmit data such as the aforementioned positionalinformation associated with the features of an ear impression.Specifically, illustrative registration system 907 may have, forexample, a processor 902 (or multiple processors) which controls theoverall operation of the registration system 907. Such operation isdefined by computer program instructions stored in a memory 903 andexecuted by processor 902. The memory 903 may be any type of computerreadable medium, including without limitation electronic, magnetic, oroptical media. Further, while one memory unit 903 is shown in FIG. 9, itis to be understood that memory unit 903 could comprise multiple memoryunits, with such memory units comprising any type of memory.Registration system 907 also comprises illustrative modem 901 andnetwork interface 904. Registration system 907 also illustrativelycomprises a storage medium, such as a computer hard disk drive 905 forstoring, for example, data and computer programs adapted for use inaccordance with the principles of the present invention as describedhereinabove. Finally, registration system 907 also illustrativelycomprises one or more input/output devices, represented in FIG. 9 asterminal 906, for allowing interaction with, for example, a technicianor database administrator. One skilled in the art will recognize thatregistration system 907 is merely illustrative in nature and thatvarious hardware and software components may be adapted for equallyadvantageous use in a computer in accordance with the principles of thepresent invention.

One skilled in the art will also recognize that the software stored inthe computer system of FIG. 9 may be adapted to perform various tasks inaccordance with the principles of the present invention. In particular,such software may be graphical software adapted to import surface modelsfrom anatomical structures, for example those models generated fromthree-dimensional laser scanning of ear impression mode. In addition,such software may allow for selective editing of those models in a waythat allows the identification of contour lines, as described above, orthat permits a user to remove or reshape various portions of thoseanatomical models as described above. The computer system may be adaptedto automatically generate points associated with a feature, such as theaperture, of ear impressions so as to create a vector describing theshape and orientation of the feature in three-dimensional space. Suchsoftware may also function to automatically register that feature with acorresponding feature on another ear impression by calculating the threedimensional translation and rotation of the vector in order to align oneear impression model with another. The software of a computer-basedsystem such as registration system 907 may also be adapted to performother functions which will be obvious in light of the teachings herein.All such functions are intended to be contemplated by these teachings.

The foregoing Detailed Description is to be understood as being in everyrespect illustrative and exemplary, but not restrictive, and the scopeof the invention disclosed herein is not to be determined from theDetailed Description, but rather from the claims as interpretedaccording to the full breadth permitted by the patent laws. It is to beunderstood that the embodiments shown and described herein are onlyillustrative of the principles of the present invention and that variousmodifications may be implemented by those skilled in the art withoutdeparting from the scope and spirit of the invention. Those skilled inthe art could implement various other feature combinations withoutdeparting from the scope and spirit of the invention.

1. A method for detecting an aperture of a graphical representation of an ear impression comprising the steps of: determining a first plurality of contour lines on a surface of said graphical representation; determining a difference value for each contour line in said first plurality of contour lines, said difference value a function of the difference between a first value of a characteristic of each contour line and a second value of said characteristic of an adjacent contour line; and identifying the contour line in said first plurality of contour lines having a greatest value of said difference value.
 2. The method of claim 1 wherein said step of determining a first plurality of contour lines comprises: orienting said graphical representation in a predetermined orientation in three-dimensional space; causing a plane to intersect a surface of said graphical representation at a plurality of levels along an axis; and determining where said plane intersects said surface at each level in said plurality of levels.
 3. The method of claim 2 further comprising: identifying those contour lines in said first plurality of contour lines associated with a portion of said graphical representation.
 4. The method of claim 3 wherein said step of identifying those contour lines in said first plurality of contour lines associated with a portion of said graphical representation comprises: determining that a second plurality of contour lines are present at a level in said plurality of levels; and selecting as said aperture that contour line in said second plurality of contour lines that has a center that is a minimum distance from a center of an adjacent contour line.
 5. The method of claim 1 wherein said characteristic is a contour line diameter.
 6. The method of claim 1 further comprising: applying a weight to each contour line in said plurality of contour lines according to a position of said contour line relative to said graphical representation; calculating a contour index for each contour line in said plurality of contour lines as a function of said weight and said difference value; and selecting as said aperture a contour line adjacent to said contour line having said greatest value of said contour index.
 7. An apparatus for detecting an aperture of a graphical representation of an ear impression comprising: means for determining a first plurality of contour lines on a surface of said graphical representation; means for determining a difference value for each contour line in said first plurality of contour lines, said difference value a function of the difference between a first value of a characteristic of each contour line and a second value of said characteristic of an adjacent contour line; and means for identifying the contour line in said first plurality of contour lines having a greatest value of said difference value.
 8. The apparatus of claim 7 wherein said means for determining a first plurality of contour lines comprises: means for orienting said graphical representation in a predetermined orientation in three-dimensional space; means for causing a plane to intersect a surface of said graphical representation at a plurality of levels along an axis; and means for determining where said plane intersects said surface at each level in said plurality of levels.
 9. The apparatus of claim 8 further comprising: means for identifying those contour lines in said first plurality of contour lines associated with a portion of said graphical representation.
 10. The apparatus of claim 9 wherein said means for identifying those contour lines in said first plurality of contour lines associated with a portion of said graphical representation comprises: means for determining that a second plurality of contour lines are present at a level in said plurality of levels; and means for selecting as said aperture that contour line in said second plurality of contour lines that has a center that is a minimum distance from a center of an adjacent contour line.
 11. The apparatus of claim 7 wherein said characteristic is a contour line diameter.
 12. The apparatus of claim 7 further comprising: means for applying a weight to each contour line in said plurality of contour lines according to a position of said contour line relative to said graphical representation; means for calculating a contour index for each contour line in said plurality of contour lines as a function of said weight and said difference value; and means for selecting as said aperture a contour line adjacent to said contour line having said greatest value of said contour index.
 13. A computer readable medium comprising computer program instructions which, when executed by a processor, perform the steps of a method for identifying an aperture of an ear impression, said steps comprising: determining a first plurality of contour lines on a surface of said graphical representation; determining a difference value for each contour line in said first plurality of contour lines, said difference value a function of the difference between a first value of a characteristic of each contour line and a second value of said characteristic of an adjacent contour line; and identifying the contour line in said first plurality of contour lines having a greatest value of said difference value.
 14. The computer readable medium of claim 13 wherein said computer program instructions defining the step of determining a first plurality of contour lines comprise computer program instructions defining the steps of: orienting said graphical representation in a predetermined orientation in three-dimensional space; causing a plane to intersect a surface of said graphical representation at a plurality of levels along an axis; and determining where said plane intersects said surface at each level in said plurality of levels.
 15. The computer readable medium of claim 14 further comprising computer program instructions which, when executed by a processor, define the step of: identifying those contour lines in said first plurality of contour lines associated with a portion of said graphical representation.
 16. The computer readable medium of claim 15 wherein said computer program instructions defining the step of identifying those contour lines in said first plurality of contour lines associated with a desired portion of said graphical representation comprise computer program instructions defining the steps of: determining that a second plurality of contour lines are present at a level in said plurality of levels; and selecting as said aperture that contour line in said second plurality of contour lines that has a center that is a minimum distance from a center of an adjacent contour line.
 17. The computer readable medium of claim 13 wherein said characteristic is a contour line diameter.
 18. The computer readable medium of claim 13 further comprising computer program instructions which, when executed by a processor, define the steps of: applying a weight to each contour line in said plurality of contour lines according to a position of said contour line relative to said graphical representation; calculating a contour index for each contour line in said plurality of contour lines as a function of said weight and said difference value; and selecting as said aperture a contour line adjacent to said contour line having said greatest value of said contour index. 